


I'm a Flirt

by idyll



Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: Ficlet, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-06-02
Updated: 2007-06-02
Packaged: 2017-10-07 10:31:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/64277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/idyll/pseuds/idyll
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's a team night out, and Spencer decides to watch.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I'm a Flirt

Another team night at the pub, and Spencer's spent most of it watching his teammates simply because he enjoys it.

JJ, Garcia, and Emily are at a table together, as is usual these days, and when Spencer looks at them they are strong and confident, secure in their own instincts and abilities, and aware of the safety net that is their friends around them and a place in which they are known.

He likes to see them laugh loud and open-mouthed, without care of who's watching and judging, and he likes that the material of their shirts is thinner, the necklines more revealing, and that their heels are higher and less practical.

Men are drawn to them like fireflies, and they share toothy smiles and hard-eyed glances, and Spencer remembers going to D.C.'s Take Back The Night Celebration, and chanting with JJ and Garcia: _YES MEANS YES NO MEANS NO WHATEVER WE WEAR WHEREVER WE GO!_

*

Morgan dances with whatever ladies come his way, and a few are beautiful, some are lovely, most are plain, and one or two are downright unattractive--aesthetically speaking--but Spencer's always had the feeling that to Morgan it doesn't matter and he doesn't care.

For Morgan, Spencer thinks, it's _just_ about dancing, just about the moment and the moment alone. That surprised him in the beginning, and for a long time afterwards, because Morgan is so attractive that it's easy to assign him superficial motivations. But Spencer's been learning to look as carefully at the people around him as he does at Unsubs, and upon deeper reflection the only surprising thing is that it's solely women Morgan draws forward by way of a hand on a wrist or hip or nape.

*

Hotch is here tonight, which isn't always the case because he tries to spend all of his off-time with his family. But every once in a while it seems that Hotch realizes he has to remember that his team is made up of _people_, and so he comes out and is apart but not.

He's standing with his back to the bar, facing the rest of the room and smiling faintly. People approach him--men and women alike--and Hotch sends them away with kind eyes and a bland face, and Spencer might be the only one who notices that it's more encouraging than not. After all, everyone likes to think they'd be the exception to someone's air of disregard.

Spencer is envious of Hotch's ability to be both in a moment and removed from it simultaneously, but he knows it comes with a cost because he can read it on Hotch's face, in the bags under his eyes that were there before his son was born and will be there even after his (inevitable) divorce and loss of custody.

Looking at Hotch on nights like this makes Spencer sad because it's so easy to read all of their futures and he'd still like to have some hope.

*

Gideon never comes out with them, though he always has some place else to be, someone else to be with.

Spencer thinks it's telling. More so than his own sometimes obsessive observation, the ladies' carefree pleasure, Morgan's tireless dancing, or Hotch's careful watch.

*

In the contemplative hour of three a.m. Derek tells Spencer about what _he_ saw--the people who orbited Spencer and tried to catch his eye--and he doesn't laugh about and isn't pleased by Spencer's obliviousness.

"You have to step outside yourself," Derek says, his tone implying this is a lesson only Spencer hasn't learned.

"Okay," Spencer says, because he doesn't want to be the one to say that, no, none of them do that. Not on their off hours together, not when they have someone to be with, and not even when they leave together.

*

The morning is bright and warm, and Spencer wakes to the scent of bacon and orange juice.

When he stumbles into Derek's kitchen breakfast is waiting for him. Derek's dimples show when he smiles, and Spencer decides to try to find his future in the mornings, not the nights, and he wonders if maybe that's what Gideon's done.

.End


End file.
